The currently WIN-owned stations would fit in nicely with the other Grant Broadcasters-owned stations in South East NSW. Slim possibility that SRN/BOG might try and pick it up to have a presence in Wollongong and something of a 2nd Sydney station.
…or even a weekly one after News Corp and ACM last year decided to stop running print editions of the Macarthur Chonicle and Campbelltown-Macarthur Advertiser respectively?
How on earth then does ARN get away with transmitting 101.7 from Artarmon up on the North Shore? Or having WSFM participate in the Sydney radio surveys while The Edge doesn’t?
If it looks and sounds like a radio station for all of Sydney…
WSFM isn’t licenced for Western Sydney & hasn’t been since it converted to FM, at least the 101.7 frequency.
The main WSFM licence for 101.7 is a Sydney wide licence the same as the other commercials, the 2 WSFM translators are still licenced as Western Sydney only licences.
True. I remember reading something though that the reason ARN got an exemption to own WS, KIIS and Edge is that 2WS was once licenced to western Sydney. If I understood correctly they took into account the history that all 3 were once in different licence areas.
https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2017C01135
The most recent version of the Licence Area Plan – Sydney Radio from 2017. Schedule Two lists all three WSFM licences as being for “WESTERN SUBURBS RA1”, despite 101.7 sharing the same characteristics as the other Sydney FMs.
Hmm, well I wonder when/how that changed, especially the 2017 LAP?
It has to be a typo, but how that came about I don’t know, because it wasn’t like that prior, 101.7 was listed on the licence as Sydney RA1, not Western Sydney RA1.
Don’t suppose anyone has an older copy of the LAP (after 2WS converted to FM) or a previous licence prior to the reissue last year?
There’s no way they could legally broadcast from Artarmon/Gore Hill with the specifications they have if they are restricted to the LAP of Western Sydney RA1.
In 1989/1990 2WS took legal action against the federal government claiming that the tender process for the Sydney AM to FM conversions was unfair as it would have forced 2WS to pay full price for a limited coverage western suburbs FM licence. 2WS won the case.
The upshot was that eventually the government decided that both FM licences would be broadcast from Artarmon and that 2WS had equality. The idea of a second transmitter at Prospect was scrapped.
And they have the same transmitter specs as 2DAY, 2MMM and KIIS.
@littlegezzybear I remember reading that 2WS could have paid a % of revenue to convert to FM (using the same regional conversion option that 2KA and 3BO took up), which would have resulted in a conversion fee of $5.5 mil, as opposed to the $8 mil they paid for the Sydney wide option. But the $5.5 mil fee would have meant a TX based in the western suburbs rather than the main Sydney site at Artarmon.
It appears that 2WS may have implied it was a regional station to try to get the discount, though the federal government had already confirmed it was a capital city station when they knocked back joint ownership of 2WS and 2CH.
I agree. But I believe it might have interfered with people’s television signal if its was too powerful the signal. Not that it matters, maybe the issue goes away now we are digital.
I remember the long delay for the conversion, it might have been the legal challenge 2ws had which delayed which makes sense.
There would still be an FM licence on 91.3. The DAB+ allocation Nine has is from 2UE and 2GB, there are no callsigns, no recognition by ACMA of digital only stations. An interesting conundrum if a complaint was investigated against a digital only station, it would be under the analogue licensee.
The only way Nine could make a change with C91.3 is to have say, 2KY or Rete Italia buy the licence, put their program on FM and convert C91.3 to their 2UE/2GB digital.
That would require a mass radio handout to the Campbelltown licence area to ensure viability. Considering DAB+ began in 2009 and this have NEVER been done despite commonsense dictating a mass radio handout as was done by SA FM and others at the dawn of FM commercial radio indicates to me that radio as a whole doesn’t want DAB+.
@AustralianAerial is right, on sold to Grants is a more likely option. The revenue of i98 is nothing compared to a successful metro station. Nine would be after simplicity.
I wonder if that would be enforceable after the 4MIX/ACMA AAT decision that prevented ACMA from licence conditions on 4MIX Ipswich.
The details are quite public, you’ve mentioned most of it. ARN have one licence in each market, so the overlap is not a concern only if two and one for example.
If you think there is more to it, outline it and I will ring ACMA.
The ACMA and predecessors determined metro as the five cap cities and Western Sydney licence area.
Western Sydney as a licence area is an outlier, the original Ipswich licence and Mornington Peninsula were incorporated into their metro area long ago, similar to Rocky/Gladstone, T’ba/Warwick and Spencer Gulf North.
Correct, that’s how ARN get away with it. Three licences in three discrete licence areas.
They can because this is the reason why the FM conversion was delayed due to action from Sydney licensees. The govt via the regulator of the day declared the 2WS/2UUS licence to be a metro licence and hence when licence areas were defined via the BSA 1992, Western Sydney was, by the regulator considered a metro licence.
Thank you! You got it in one. The digital evolution of that earlier declaration.
Thank you also! It’s an interesting judgement to read. Freely available online for light bedtime reading to fall asleep to
At present, David Archer has been presenting the workday slot from 10am through until 3pm since the death of Stuart Cranney in March 2020. With that in mind, adding an additional daytime announcer should see David Archer’s workload being reduced.
Industry sources familiar with the plans, who spoke anonymously because talks are confidential, said Mr Wheatley and Oceania Partners are preparing to commence a formal process to sell the two radio stations – 91.9 Sea FM and 92.7 Mix FM – on the Sunshine Coast.
I wonder if Bill will swoop and add these stations to his SRN.
SCA, ARN and Nova Ent cannot purchase these stations due to overlap with the Brisbane LA.
Not many other candidates, could WIN be interested and compete with Grant like they do in Wollongong?
If these stations go to SRN would Bill make Sea fm New fm and Mix 92.7 Brock or 2SM?
